Shoujo Kakumei Utena Fanfiction

I fell in love with Shoujo Kakumei Utena from the moment I saw it, and spent roughly two years thinking, debating, arguing and writing about it. Then I burned out. The results were several short works and one long incomplete multipart work, Jaquemart. These stories represent my latest attempt at fanfiction, before I basically gave it up. I am still fairly proud of all my work here.

Update: October 3rd, 2003

I am perhaps less burned out then I thought, as I recently found time and
interest enough to finish, revise and release one of my incomplet stories,
as can be seen below.

Shorter Works

A lengthy post-series story with some explicit sex in it. I
am told by various people that this isn't really a lemon due to the proportion
of story to sex, but for my own insurance the usual warnings about age or offence
apply.

Arsenal deals most immediately with events of episodes 28 and 29 (the Ruka episodes), but contains spoilers (some more oblique than others) for the series as a whole. Not my favourite among my Utena stories; like The Graduates, I was not able to work out the idea in my head on "paper" in such a way as to sufficiently convey it.

Written for Valentine's Day 2001, centred around Touga and Juri in the wake of episode 36. And no, it has nothing to do with the musical. Chess contests with Sonata For Piano Duo in my mind as the best-constructed Utena story I've written, the one that came out in the writing most like I envisioned it in my head.

As I said in my author's notes back when it was originally released, this is more of a novella than a short story. Fugue deals with the Student Council in the aftermath of episodes 31 and 32. I look back on it and am generally quite satisfied; it doesn't have the narrative tightness or pacing of Chess or Sonata for Piano Duo, but sprawl can sometimes have its own appeal.

A strange story, written under the influence of Robert Graves, Elizabeth Hand, and a rather weird e-mail discussion with Paul Corrigan. Did not come out as well as I intended. I think the adjective I would apply to this story at my most positive would be "interesting". Maybe. Not comprehensible if you haven't seen all of the TV series, and maybe not even then.

A parody/spoof/vaguely humourous story touched off by a post someone else made to an Utena mailing list. Either an argument for why I should have written more humour pieces, or for why I would have been better off sticking to serious stuff, depending on your response.

Co-written with Paul Corrigan. This one should really be allowed to speak for itself, although I will say there are plentiful spoilers in it for both the movie and the TV series. Much easier to understand if you're Canadian, or, like Paul, from Michigan, which is practically Canada anyway.

My first short piece for the series, focusing on Nanami. Some spoilers for the first 13 episodes. Mixed feelings about this one, but not bad.

Jaquemart

Jaquemart was my attempt to provide what I would call a "synthesizing" story following the ending of the TV series, one that would draw together disparate elements, give answers to unanswered questions, suggest new directions, and generally provide an expanded personal vision of the strange world that Shoujo Kakumei Utena dwells in.

Jaquemart has all the strengths and weaknesses of my earlier long multipart works. I tried to put too much in, bit off more than I could chew, and got choked; I think frustration over the story's weaknesses and my failure to keep a handle on it contributed to but were not the only cause of my burnout with Utena and fandom in general. There are tons of things I like in Jaquemart, and tons of things I dislike--the major thing I dislike being the fact that I never finished it, disappointing both myself and my readers.

I caution anyone thinking of starting this story that it's unlikely to be finished, although it is the most likely among my unfinished works to be finished sometime in the future should my interest in anime fanfiction revive along with my being granted much more free time than I currently have. This is damning, however, with faint praise.

Emily Iizuka, a truly exceptional reader and commentator, set up a page called The Jaquemart Companion. A flattering and astonishing effort, and a better guide to the story than I'd be able to write myself.

I was also fortunate enough to receive fan art for Jaquemart from some very talented people, which I have on my fan art page.

Obligatory Disclaimer: The stories on these pages are based off the copyrighted works of other people; specific credit is given in the stories themselves. The stories themselves, on the other hand, belong to me, and while due to the nature of the Internet I cannot stop you doing whatever you want with them, I politely request that if you want to post them anywhere, you drop me an e-mail asking my permission (which you will almost certainly receive).